Hard Spell (24 page)

  "But what they're doing is fucking vigilantism," Karl said. "And that's against the law, goddammit."

  "It is and it isn't," McGuire said sourly. "Their brand of vigilantism is actually legal in Pennsylvania, and most of the New England states."

  "That's because when they were colonies, there were laws on the books against witchcraft," I told Karl. "Laws that nobody ever got around to repealing."

  "So these fuckers can kidnap Rachel, torture her until she confesses, and then... what?" Karl asked.

  "Burn her alive," McGuire said. "Just like in Europe, five hundred fucking years ago."

  I looked at McGuire, then at Karl. My throat felt tight as I said, "Unless we find her first."

As we left McGuire's office, Louise the Tease motioned us over. She had the phone receiver in one hand, and she held it out to me as I reached her desk. "It's for you," she said. "Some doctor, says he's at the hospital."

  As my hand reached out, I ran down the list of all the bad things this could mean. It's a good thing my mind works fast, because the list was a long one.

  I took the phone. "This is Detective Sergeant Markowski. Who's this?"

  "Hello, Detective." The voice was male, and deep. "This is Dr Barry Santangelo at Mercy Hospital. Benjamin Prescott, that man from DC who suffered a recent stroke, is a patient of mine."

  
He's dead,
I thought.
Prescott's dead, and they're gonna say it's my fault. And maybe they're right.

  But what I heard instead was, "Mr Prescott has come out of his coma."

  A few seconds went by while I got used to breathing again. I hadn't even realized I'd stopped.

  "Detective? Still there?"

  "Yeah, sorry, Doctor. That's great news, really great."

  "Relapse is always a possibility in these cases, of course, but not very likely. I just finished a thorough neurological examination, and it's my opinion that Mr Prescott is going to stay awake – and, quite possibly, recover completely."

  "I'm really glad to hear he's going to be okay."

  "It's a nice change for me, to be the bearer of good news," Santangelo said, "but that's not why I'm calling."

  "Oh? What is it, then?"

  "Well, Mr Prescott's still in intensive care for the time being, that's standard procedure with coma patients. Still... I don't see a problem in this case."

  "I'm sorry, Doctor, you lost me. Problem with what?"

  "Prescott wants to see you. You and your partner."

• • • •

I'd first been to Mercy's Intensive Care Unit when Christine was a patient there. That was before I took her home and... did what I did. The place doesn't exactly have happy associations for me, but I suppose that's true for most people.

  In my case, the creepiness factor was ramped up by the fact that I'd recently been looking at video of this very area, trying to figure out what had happened to Rachel Proctor. I thought I knew the answer to that now, but the knowledge didn't keep me from a mild case of the willies as Karl and I took turns rubbing foamy disinfectant over our hands from the dispenser they keep just outside the door.

  "I hate this place," Karl said softly. "But maybe not so much today as usual. You ready?"

  I nodded, and he used his hip to nudge the saucersized metal plate that was set into the wall. The double doors opened, and I followed him through.

I've been in a few hospital ICUs, and they're all laid out essentially the same: a big circular chamber, with glass-enclosed patient rooms along the outer ring and a monitoring station in the middle that looks like something you'd find on the bridge of a battleship. The thin, middle-aged nurse behind the desk facing the door had the same calm face and emotionless delivery you find in ICU nurses everywhere. "Can I help you?"

  "We're here to see one of the patients," Karl said. "Ben Prescott."

  She glanced at one of the three monitors in front of her, then looked up and said, "Visitors in Intensive Care are restricted, sir. Are you members of the immediate family?"

  I had the ID folder with my shield ready, and I flipped it open so she could see it. As she was taking that in, I said, "Dr Santangelo called us. He said it would be okay." I spoke softly. An ICU has that effect on people – like a funeral home, which my mom's generation used to call a "corpse house."

  She pressed something on her keyboard a couple of times, then looked at the screen again. "Mr. Prescott is in Room 9, officers," she said calmly. "To your right."

  We thanked her, and went to see the guy we had almost killed.

Prescott didn't look bad, considering what he'd been through. But he wasn't as elegant as he'd been behind the podium. The well-tailored suit had been replaced by a hospital gown, of course. I was momentarily surprised that they'd had one to fit him, but I guess hospitals are prepared for a wide range of patients. Prescott's hair was greasy-looking, and he had a pretty good beard stubble going. I guess the ICU staff had been more concerned with keeping him alive than well-groomed.

  "You two look familiar," he said. "And since you're not dressed as priests, I assume you're the two detectives who, they say, saved my life." His mellow tenor was scratchy and hoarse now; he'd probably had a breathing tube down his throat for a long time.

  
He doesn't remember! The stroke must've killed the brain cells where his most recent memories were stored. He doesn't know that it was me who caused him to inhale the piece of shrimp, which brought on the stroke – which nearly sent him to that Great Lecture Hall in the Sky, or so the doc said.

  "All cops receive training in CPR and the Heimlich maneuver, Professor," I said. "I'm just glad we were nearby when you started to choke."

  I walked close to the bed and put my hand out to shake. "Stan Markowski, Scranton PD, pleased to meet you." I gestured behind me. "And this is my partner, Karl Renfer. He's the one who did the Heimlich on you." Karl came over and shook hands.

  "WellI'm grateful to you both," Prescott said. "Thank you for saving me. Thank you very, very much."

  Strokes sometimes change people's personalities. If that's what happened here, I figured I was going to like Prescott 2.0 better than the original version.

  "What's the last thing you remember?" I asked him. "At the reception, I mean."

  Prescott shook his head slowly. "I remember shaking hands and smiling at a lot of people, all of whose faces are just a blur to me now… And I remember there was a bowl of iced shrimp nearby that I was hitting pretty hard. I
love
shrimp – or, at least I used to. They tell me that's what I was choking on. Must've swallowed too fast." He frowned. "I'm not sure that shrimp, iced or otherwise, will ever be on the menu for me again. We'll see."

  "Detective Renfer and I were close by, because we hoped to have a word with you, about a case we're working on," I said, with a straight face. "But you... got into trouble... before we had the chance."

  I saw Prescott's eyes narrow as he looked at me.

  
Uh-oh. It is starting to come back to him?

  "Markowski..." he said thoughtfully. "We had a phone conversation, didn't we, a few days before I came north?"

  "Yes, sir, that's right. We did."

  "I don't remember what we talked about, but I have the vague impression that I was pretty snotty to you." The frown of concentration gave way to a smile. "If so, please accept my apologies. I'm often rude to people, I'm afraid." He was silent for a couple of seconds. "Maybe it's time I stopped."

  Karl and I looked at each other. The raised eyebrows he was showing were reflected on my own face.

  "Well, I gather it's been a while since your last attempt to talk to me, Detective," Prescott said, "but if it's not too late to help your case, let's give it another try. I believe I owe you, and" – he made a gesture that took in the whole room – "my secretary seems to have cleared my calendar for the rest of the morning."

  He started coughing then, a dry hack that sounded loud in the small room. I started toward the nightstand next to his bed, but he waved me away, reached over himself and grabbed a red plastic tumbler full of ice water. After several long sips through the bent straw, he put the tumbler down. The coughing had stopped.

  "Sorry," he said. "Throat's still a little raw." Prescott leaned back against the pillows behind him. "So, what is it you wanted to know about?"

  "A book that you've translated," I said. "Parts of it, anyway. It's called the
Opus Mago
."

Prescott looked at me and blinked a couple of times. Then he slowly turned back toward the nightstand, got the tumbler again, and took a long sip of water. I didn't know if he was still thirsty or just buying time.

  He put the tumbler back. "Well," he said. "I suppose that explains my rudeness over the phone earlier, not" – he waved a hasty hand – "that it constitutes an excuse."

  Prescott stared at me some more. Then he gave a long sigh and said, "Can you tell me why you need to know about this... book? Forgive me if it's ground we've already covered, but…" He made a gesture toward his head.

  "No, that's not a problem," I said, then ran it down for him again – the symbols on the corpses, what we'd learned from Vollman, all of it.

  Prescott had been studying the backs of his hands during most of my recitation, and he was still looking at them when he said, "I owe my life to both of you. It could have all ended for me on the floor of that banquet room, and what an embarrassment "Parts ohat would have been."

  He looked up then – first at Karl, then at me. "So, in a very real sense, every moment of my life from that point forward is a gift from the gods." A smile came and went. "By way of the Scranton Police Department. And, despite my other failings, I'm a man who pays his debts."

  He looked at his hands again, then back at me. "All right, Detective. It doesn't amount to much, but I'll tell you what I know about the
Opus Mago
."

"Although the book was published in 1640, by a man who was burned at the stake for his trouble, most of its contents are far older. The pages I worked with have passed through who knows how many hands, over who knows how many centuries. Nothing is numbered, so it's difficult to tell what order they are supposed to be in. So I just picked one, more or less at random, and began work.

  "It was slow going. Despite the Latin name by which it's known today, most of the book is written in an obscure dialect of Ancient Sumerian that, if I may flatter myself, very few scholars are capable of working with.

  "The fragment that came into my possession consists of sixteen pages. I got through six, then stopped. Of the material I did translate, I believe some of it does pertain to this spell or ritual that you've described, which some madman is apparently trying to perform.

  "The section I worked on reveals that the total number of sacrifices required is five, and that they all be vampires – although the term used in the text is
ghosts who suck blood
. And the fifth, final sacrifice must take place as the ritual itself is being performed. A sort of culmination of the vampire bloodletting, if you will. I also get the impression, although the text is ambiguous on this point, that the rite can only be performed successfully by someone who is a worker of magic – which is the Ancient Sumerian term for wizard, and also a ghost who sucks blood. Someone who combines the attributes of both wizard and vampire, if such a thing is even possible."

  I looked at Karl, who returned my gaze and probably my expression. "Oh, yeah," I said. "It's possible, all right."

  
Vollman.

"And that's as much as I know, based on the fragments I've translated," Prescott said.

  "Why did you stop?" Karl asked him.

  Prescott studied the backs of his hands again, as if he hoped to find the answers to all of life's mysteries written there. Eventually, he looked up.

  "I stopped at the sixth page, because of a passage I found there, near the bottom. I believe I can recite it verbatim – God knows I've read it enough times. My little cerebral episode hasn't erased that part of my memory, more's the pity."

  Prescott closed his eyes, and when he spoke it was in a different tone from his usual conversational voice.

  
"Let any man who reveals the secrets of this sacred
book to strangers be accursed for all time. He shall be
blinded, then castrated, then dismembered, then burned,
to serve as instruction and example to any who would
dare let these words become known to those uninitiated
in our rites."

  Prescott opened his eyes again and spoke in his normal voice. "Scary stuff, huh?"

  "I guess you took it pretty seriously, then," I said.

  "Detective, this is a world in which we find werewolves, vampires, witchcraft, goblins, and I don't know what else. What's in that book is a curse, and yes, I took it seriously."

  I nodded. "And yet you just told us everything you found there – all that bears on our case, anyway."

  Prescott leaned back and spread his hands. "I'm on borrowed time, remember? By rights, I should be dead and buried by now. That, or a vegetable hooked up to some machine for the next thirty years, until my heart gives out." He put his hands back in his lap. "Besides, it looks as if you've got something pretty nasty brewing here in Scranton. I can't sit by and let it happen – not if I have information that will stop it."

  I started to speak, but he held out his hand, like a traffic cop. "I know what you're going to say. What I've given you
won't
stop what's being prepared by this lunatic Sligo. And you'd be right. But maybe there's something in the rest of the
Opus Mago
fragment that will."

  "Look," I said, "I appreciate the offer, more than you know. But even though you woke up from the coma, you're probably still a sick man. Flying back to Washington–"